86 BRITISH BIRDS’ EGGS. 
TREE SPARROW. 
PassER MONTANUS, Linn. 
Pl. XIIL., figs. 18-16. 
Geogr. distr.—Europe generally, N. Africa, Asia as far east as 
Japan: locally distributed and resident in Great Britain ; it has been 
found in Middlesex, Surrey, Kent, and throughout the South of England. 
Food.—Seeds and grains, berries, buds, green leaves, fruit. 
Nest.—Roughly constructed of straw, hay, roots, wool, hair and 
feathers ; thickly lined with feathers. 
Position of nest.—In holes in trees, and occasionally in clefts of 
rock or old walls; but, in Europe, it objects, as a rule, to building in 
houses.* 
Number of eggs.—4-7; usually 5. 
Time of nidification—IV-VIII; May. 
A three-brooded species. 
The young collector frequently supposes that the nest of 
the House Sparrow, when built in the fork of a tree, is 
necessarily that of the Tree Sparrow ; the latter, however, 
builds only in holes, and, as the House Sparrow occa- 
sionally selects a hole in a tree for the same purpose, it 
is best to see the birds themselves in order to be sure of 
correctly identifying the eggs. The latter are smaller, and, 
as a rule, darker than those of the commoner species, 
although in both birds they vary considerably, as will be seen 
in my plates. 
As would be expected from the inferior size of its eggs, 
this species is slightly smaller than the House Sparrow, 
the head and nape chestnit-colowred, with a spot behind the 
eye, and the chin black, the body above rufous-brown 
spotted with black, and with a greenish shade behind ; 
sides of the neck, breast, and under parts dull white; the 
wing-coverts rufous, edged with black and crossed by two 
white bars, the greater coverts black, with rust-reddish 
edges ; the quills blackish with rufous edges, the tail rufous- 
brown, leqs pale yellow. Its chirrup also differs from that 
of Pusser domesticus, being shriller and having more claim 
to be called a song, though only consisting of a repetition 
of its call-note. 
I have taken the eggs of this bird both in Kent and 
Norfolk. The nest is usually placed in a hole in an old 
pollard willow. 
* Seebohm says, “It is never seen in the towns (in our islands) but 
sometimes approaches the villages, where it associates with the House 
Sparrow.” 
